Dear Ed

I have studied I Am That daily and almost exclusively for about ayear. I want to go deeper in my understanding of this teaching. It ishow I discovered your site. Trying to think of a question to makecontact with you and your web offering, what comes up is the naggingquestion about Nisargadata's smoking and, as I learn from your site,his and Jean Dunn's death by smoking. In spite of the "I am not mybody" and "I am not my mind" consciousness, I find it difficult toreconcile their teachings with this enslavement and bondage and surelyan unnecessarily painful death

Thank you,DKK

Dear DKK,

Feel free to ask away anytime. I am here.
Re Maharaj and Jean's smoking.

You do understand. You have nothing to do with your body or its pain. All bodies are going to die, painful or not.

To a Jnani, the body is no more than an image on a movie screen. Would he care whether a character smoked or not, or died of throat cancer? The Jnani knows he is not the body. He does not care. If his body rejects smoking for health reasons, that's fine with him. If his body chooses to smoke. It is fine with him.

You are making his non-problem into your problem. Only go backwards into yourself and see who you are. Then you will see it is all a joke and that only you are.

Follow the sense of I to the deepest part of your being.

Ed

Hi Ed,

I read the recent post on having a living guru and your reply.

Boy Ed! You aren't making this easier!

You say that neither Ramana nor Robert are available, find yourself and you find them.

Then you say that it's a hundred times better to love and serve a guru, and that it MUST be a living guru.The problem is how do you find a living guru, and how do you know that he is a Jnani.

You keep looking--but not too hard. Attend to your own self. Find the subject, the looker, the listener.

I know that it is up to the student, but it doesn't make it easier. Enlightened individuals don't say they are when asked about it.Yet it seems to me that those that followed Robert, like you, KNEW that he was a Jnani. Doesn't it make it easier when you know?

Of course it makes it easier. But though I was struck by Robert in the beginning, it was well over a year before I really knew and trusted.

Ramana, Nisargargadatta and some others, those that went to India for example, KNEW they were meeting Jnanis.

No, they heard that from others. Many who stayed with these gurus never accepted them as such. It is all a game anyway; they don't exist and neither do you--not as you think.

What about us here in North America? Do we have to go to India?

I would never go to India for a number of reasons. I met all of my teachers--ALL--right here in the USA and Robert in LA. If you can find a true guru in Los Angeles, you can find them anywhere.

I would not put much stock in gurus who do workshops, seminars, traveling circuses. Ramana, Nisargadatta, Rajneesh, Robert became nailed down sooner or later. You can go see them that do not do side shows, or wait for one of their students to do a side show in your town.

Ed,
After a first read through most of the site I just wish I could
hang out with you a bit rather than do email. In any case, It might be
good to tell you a few things to set the frame for later questions.
For many years I was intensely involved in Siddha Yoga but
eventually left it. I didn't miss what you had to say about Muktananda, and
I understand and accept the perspective as probably true. But for
me, there was that power that promised transformation. It existed
and that's all I knew directly. The promise did not quite live up to
expectations, granted. In fact, ironically, my first shaktipat
experience was more dramatic than almost anything that happened later.
Do you have any thoughts about any of this, Ed?
Thanks, by the way, for sharing all of that information about
Robert. Just knowing such people exist is helpful.
John

-------------------------------------------------
Ed wrote:
I found Muktananda to be superficial. Muktananda et
al emphasized experiences, Robert and I, n-experience.
Ed

Dear Ed,

My last girlfiriend before marriage used to fly down from New York
to Sedona once a year to be with Lester Levenson who created the
Sedona Method. I've got a bunch of recorded talks that the ex brought
back with her. But I just didn't feel a pull. There seemed to be a
big emphasis on things like "financial abundance," which even now
on their website is at the top of the list of things that can come
from the method.

Ed wrote:

The use the sales technique to sell themselves and make a living.
They would never make a living on seekers alone. The technique is
not bad at all, but I think the followers have to let go of letting
go as a technique.

----------------------------------------------------------
John wrote:

Since my orientation has always been yogic, it might be a fair
question to ask if I have any sense at all of what you're really
talking about. Maybe only in a negative way, in feeling some
disatisfaction with that whole pursuit. Well, let's put it this way, what I do
understand is what you and Robert are up to is something of a
different order from that kundalini yoga path and that it's important
not to confuse the two.

Ed wrote:

Absolutely. Kundalini is about body, energy and experiences. Jnana
is about finding that which preceeds all experiences and the body
itself. That is, finding your unborn nature. Like apples vs.
mountains (or tablewear for that matter).

John wrote:

How meaningfully you can get to know somebody this way is
debatable, but its better than nothing. Maybe you have super powers and can
extract a hologram of my entire life from my words. I used to
believe that gurus had that ability.

Ed wrote:

If I had the super powers I'd be too lazy to use them except to
make money gambling or the stock market so I didn't have to do
anything anymore.
Ed

John wrote:

Ed,
I just got up from meditation. Lately I've been going into it
holding some essence of you and Robert in my mind's eye. Af first
there's a kind of opening into stillness or neutrality, but then the
shakti rushes into that space with more voltage then I've felt in
years. It occilates back and forth like this - a brief moment of
stillness then a lot of movement. It's like there is some internal
switching point I've just become aware of that maybe would lead into
silence but as soon as I find it.. zap! Epilepsy.

Ed wrote:

Hi John,

Interesting phenomena, I've never experienced that. But, it means
nothing. It will pass. It is temporary and has nothing to do with
your task.

Just feel for your sense of existence, not of the body, but of you,
and attend to that.

This is really a quite subtle exercise, but the Self is subtle and
quiet. Stay there.

Ed

One more question for the pile. Do you think Robert is as much available for people who never met him as he is for you?

No.

I wonder this but then think, if he is, then so is Ramana and why not just go back to Ramana?

Neither are available except both are yourself. Find yourself and you find them.

Thing is, Robert is easier to relate to because he was American.

Yes. He is easier to relate to but they say the same thing. Ramana works are very traditional and hard to follow for Westreners.

Also, robert speaks on different levels for different people. Therefore, don't ponder on apparent contradictions. Just let the words in and go where they may.

In Silence of the Heart he says that to love and serve the guru is higher and quicker than doing inquiry or anything else.

Right. One hundred times better.

He also said you need to focus on one teacher. Are either of those things possible when there is no body to relate to anymore (especially for those who never had any physical contact with him)?

No. It must be a live guru. He was adamnant about that.

But then there's you. I don't know, are you following after Robert now?

No, his body is dead, mine alive. I do not hold a candle to him. He is as far beyond my attainment as an elephant above an ant, yet we are one and the same. I follow after him as I attend to myself.

That is, have you taken on the same function or do you see it more as maintaining the memory of Robert and to providing insight when people ask for it.

Both and neither. it is up to the student. Robert had no function other than that given to him by others. In his mind, he was nothing, he did nothing; people only thougth he did. I am nothing, neither are you. You don't exist. Be happy.

From G and my response,

Hi Ed,

Can I ask about Self-awareness, Being, "I"...all of this. "Self-Enquiry" brings you to the I-thought, which will bring it back to the heart. This will eventually destroy the I am the body, the I-thought...the ego.

Don't make it so complicated. I-thought is a fiction, only Am is. Staying in the sense of existence--or the feeling I--will get you to the same place--knowledge first hand that you are beyond the body and world.

Staying in the self, or Self-Awareness as much as you can through self-Enquiry or through other means, I have difficulties in understand what are the best ways to do this. Especially following the "I" to it's source, the right side of the heart.

Absolutely forget the heart. That was a ruse by Ramana to turn people inward. The real inward is not into a place in the body because the body does not exist as an independent entity, rather go into That which cognizes and is aware, the sense of I, or the unformed matrix of Am-ness. Just resting in self, going deeper into silence to its deepest level. Everything in the world is just “noise” added onto your true nature. Some go into that silence by “looking” within, others by “feeling” in, sort of falling backwards into your true self.

Briefly, How to get the I-Though to go back at the source...the heart.
How to stay in Self-Awareness.

-G.


You don't get the I-thought to go back to the source. Concentrating on the I-thought makes it real. Ask once "Who am I?, look within and do nothing more. Repeat every minute or two. After a while, the minutes will stretch into many minutes. Just keep going. You want to attend to where the I-thought comes from, not the thought itself.

FORGET ABOUT THE HEART.

Ed

Falling Into Self

Dearest Ed,

I'm good I am reading Roberts'book and a little 80 pg. book called "the lazy mans guide to enlightenment" by a guy Thaddeus Golas. These are the only books I read, and most comfortable with. I am not doing a dedicated meditation but I like self-inquiry. When I go into meditation, sometimes I get strange flashes of light. I don't know what that is if anything. But I like best just abiding in the nothing. It feels like falling backwards or vibrating. I could ask you a hundered stupid questions but I think they are all pointless anyway.

D


Hi D

Ask any pointless questions you want. Everything is without a point anyway.

Glad you are doing well.

Yes, abiding in nothingness is the best.

That is exactly how it should feel, like falling backwards into yourself--the first person.

The flashes of light are Kundalini expressions, so don't pay much attention to them.

Write anytime.

Ed

.
Dear Ed,

This character is practicing looking into the Illuminated Space behind the 3rd eye chakra 2-3 times daily. Very early or very late in the day seems the most productive. With introspection (microanalysis) it is realized that the Awareness that is present, comes before and observes: thoughts, feelings, emotions, bodily sensations and to some extent "my" personality. I know that I am not any of these, since I can observe them.

Right On--keep going.

Looking from this space into the body reveals only more space. Bodily sensations are sensed to be coming from discrete locations in that space, but nothing solid is percieved in it. Is this what you described as the memory map of our bodies? Continued introspection brings the point home, that all experience in the "ego mind" are observed or experienced only throught our senses, neural net, ect, colored through our beliefs and positionalities and finally compared to past experiences and memories, so we can lablel and catagorize them. We experience nothing directly in the would, so there is no proof that the world is Real, or that even I exist.

Too much conceptualization. All experiences are not observed through our body-mind. Body-mind itself is as unreal as the phenomenal world. Only Consciousness exists--EVERYTHING is contained and only an image in Consciousness.

This being understood, i rest in the empyness and experience the almost blissfull awareness that Awareness is all there is. There is still the sensation of being a separate sense of Awareness,, surrounded by nothing. I do ask the question "Who A I" or What am I? Silence is always the answer.

Rest only in observing the Awareness. Be aware of Awareness. This is Self-Awareness, Abiding in Self.

I have been able to fall forward, but not backwards. It leaves me dizzy and a little disoriented. The experience of falling into a bright sun, as you had discribed did cause a subtle shift in awareness...but still "no cigar" (and no sun tan). No expectation is attatched to this practice...i just enjoy the blissfull escape, but the desire for Awakening to happen is all that i ever think about.

Forget about falling forward of backward; it is a help for some. Juest rest in observing awareness. You are doing very well. Keep it up. Do not deviate.

Psychotropic Medications-
-
I have a new question. I have suffered from severe anxiety and panic attacks for most of my life. I am currently taking low doses of a sedative to basically keep my mind "even". At this point, I'm not even sure that I could maintain even the bare minimum of concentration required for any type of meditation without their use. My question is this: Do you think that the use of such sedatives (xanax and the like), would or could somehow prevent one from attaining Realization?

No, neither anti-anxiety or anti-depressive meds would prevent self-realization. They affect the body-mind and you are not that. You are far beyond that. Only attend to your own sens eof being or existence.

Please don't consider this medical advice in any way, shape, or form. I know you're not a doctor, and I'm not asking you this question on the basis of whether or not I should continuing taking the sedatives.

But I have a doctorate in clinical psychology and was trained to be a psychologist even though not so licensed. I am well aware of the effects of many psychotropic medications.

Your answer will have no impact on that, so rest assured. However, I would like to know if there is any possible effect on the attainment of Realization with their use. Eventually, I will stop taking them. What I was hoping to do was to conquer the fear beforehand, much like Bill W. or whatever his name is (the founder of AA), only stopped drinking AFTER his experience. I still have other fears that surface that I work through, so it's not as if I'm completing avoiding working through that.

I emphasize meds will not affect enlightenment. Even alcoholism does not. These are of the body. You are not the body. There will be lots of changes before and after enlightenment. Do not worry about where you are now. Where you are now, what you are doing in terms of eating, meds, drinking, etc., will not impact your enlightnment. Of course, doing without bad habits helps, such as eating meat, too much alcohol, etc.

I know there are some like Ram Dass who claim to have attained some Realization with the use of psychedelics and the like. So, I would assume that since the body isn't me, nor is the mind, etc, that the use of these medications to enable me to concentrate at all wouldn't have an effect on Realization, but I don't know for sure. Thanks in advance.

No effect whatsoever. Still, not eating meat, cheese, eggs, etc. does lighten the mind a lot for some reason. I felt a huge rush of increased self-esteem and lowered guilt when I stopped eating meat many years ago.

Ed